Hamlin has high expectations amid changes at Joe Gibbs Racing. The team lineup looks different with Matt Kenseth replacing Joey Logano. The cars look different and hopefully are more durable.

That has Hamlin making the bold predictions that are his nature.

“Our goals haven’t changed from one year to the next,” Hamlin said. “We look at it (that) we need to win at least six to seven races. That’s where we feel like we’ll be this year.

“We need to fill up the stat column with the proper amount of top-fives and top-10s that you need to win a championship. The champion is not going to go out there and win one or two races for the year.”

Those numbers will be 17-18 top-fives and 22-23 top-10s, according to the 32-year-old Hamlin, who has averaged 4.5 wins, 12 top-fives and 17.3 top-10s in his last four years.

Last season, Hamlin won five races, posted 14 top-fives and 17 top-10s. But Hamlin, who lost the 2010 championship in the final race of the season, didn’t contend in 2012 as his team struggled with reliability and strategy.

Hamlin was in contention until the Chase race at Martinsville when an ignition switch disassembled during the race.

“We’ve won a lot of races year after year and we are always a team that wins a lot of races,” Hamlin said. “We’re always in the hunt and then something mechanical happens to our cars and it takes us out of the championship.

“Hopefully those bugs have been fixed. We’re working on a new process to make our cars more tough and rigid and making sure they don’t fall apart.”

The new process is a new system of checks-and-balances on the JGR cars, Hamlin said.

“It was human error,” Hamlin said. “You need to take that out of the equation. To do that, you have to have more than one set of eyes working on your car.

“So we’re hopefully working on some things to make sure that our cars are as reliable as the planes we fly in the air.”

While he must wait and see if his cars are more durable, Hamlin has a good feel for the impact of adding Kenseth, the 2003 Cup champion, to the team.

Kenseth, who has 24 career victories, will replace Logano in the No. 20 car after 13 years at Roush Fenway Racing.

Kenseth’s driving style is similar to that of teammate Kyle Busch as far as how he brakes and gets on the throttle — Kenseth and Busch will drive deeper into the corner than Hamlin, who considers himself more of a finesse, rhythm driver.

But Hamlin believes he will be able to learn from Kenseth, much how Hamlin has helped teammate Kyle Busch at Martinsville and Busch has helped Hamlin at Charlotte.

“It’s hard to say really until we get to a race weekend and situations to figure out what Matt brings to the table,” Hamlin said. “Right now, he just brings his credentials.

“We know what he’s done in the past, and I know what he’s capable of on the racetrack because I race with him every week. He’s going to be a guy that takes Joe Gibbs Racing to that elite level.”

JGR has never had all three teams win multiple races in one season. The most wins for the organization came in 2010 when Hamlin won eight races and Busch won three for a total of 11.

“We haven’t had all three cars running good at any point except maybe towards the end of 2010 when Joey kind of got on a little bit of a roll,” Hamlin said.

“We haven’t had consistently three cars that won multiple races during any year. Matt is going to bring that to the table this year. He’s going to be ultracompetitive and he’s going to be a guy that you’re going to have to beat.”